Clarify everything into a toplevel file

svn path=/trunk/mono/; revision=63820

1 files changed, 101 insertions, 0 deletions

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+
+Mono is made up of many pieces of code, all of them open source, but
+different pieces of Mono use different licensing terms.
+
+For comments, corrections and updates, please contact mono@novell.com
+
+* Dual Licensing
+
+	Parts of Mono are dual licensed, they are available to the
+	public in GPL or LGPL forms, but we also offer those pieces
+	under commercial terms from Novell for when the GPL and the
+	LGPL are not suitable.
+
+	We have tried to pick the licenses that will maximize adoption
+	of Mono, so we tend to use the MIT X11 or LGPL liceses.
+
+	Contributions to dual-licensed module require that the author
+	contributes the code under the terms of the MIT X11 code, or
+	to sign an agreement that allows Novell to redistribute the
+	code under other licenses.
+
+	Contributions for other modules should be under the same license
+	terms as the rest of the module, or under MIT X11 terms. 
+
+	If you ned further information, please contact mono@novell.com
+
+* The Modules
+
+** mono/mono: the Mono VM
+
+	This code is dual licensed under the LGPL or commercial licenses. 
+
+	The LGPL ensures that Mono can be used in most scenarios, but 
+	gives Novell the flexibility to relicense the code for embedded
+	systems or commercial settings where the LGPL can not be used. 
+
+	Contact mono@novell.com for details on obtaining the Mono
+	runtime under other terms.
+
+** mono/eglib: Mono's X11 glib implementation
+
+	This is a minimal subset of glib that is to be licensed under
+	the terms of the MIT X11, this means that this code can be
+	used for any purposes by anyone.
+
+** mcs/mcs, mcs/gmcs
+
+  	The C# Compilers (1.0 and 2.0)
+
+	These compilers are dual licensed under the GPL and commercial
+	terms.
+
+** tests
+
+	Unless explicitly stated, the tests are under the MIT X11 license.
+
+** mcs/class
+
+	The class libraries developed by the Mono team are licensed
+	under the MIT X11 terms.
+
+	In addition to the class libraries developed by the Mono team,
+	there are a number of class libraries that we bundle as part
+	of the distribution that were integrated from third-parties or
+	that contain code that was originally licensed under different
+	terms, these are:
+
+	    ByteFX.Data: LGPL
+
+	    Npgsql: LGPL
+
+	    FirebirdSql.Data.Firebird: Firebird public license.
+		See: mcs/class/FirebirdSql.Data.Firebird/license.txt
+
+            ICSharpCode.SharpZipLib, GPL with exceptions.
+		See: mcs/class/ICSharpCode.SharpZipLib/README
+
+	     
+** mcs/tools
+
+	These are licensed under the MIT X11 license, except where the
+	GPL is explicitly used. 
+
+** mcs/jay
+
+	This is a port of Berkeley yacc, so it is available under the BSD
+	license.   See the license in the individual C files for details.
+
+** mono/man
+
+	Manual pages and Mono documentation are covered by the MIT X11 license. 
+
+* The Licenses
+
+	These are the licenses used in Mono, the files are located:
+
+        GNU GPL: details avaliable in the file mcs/LICENSE.GPL
+        GNU LGPL: details available in the file mcs/LICENSE.LGPL
+        MIT X11: text available in the file mcs/MIT.X11
+        MPL: text available in the file mcs/LICENSE.MPL
+